Page 125 of All I Want for Christmas

‘Absolutely not,’ she pushed back. ‘That’s just a template for beginners. A walk on the beach, takeaway coffees, and now buying a Christmas tree, is premium date territory.’

‘...So you’re saying I’m good at this, then?’ He looked down at her with a grin as he slung his arm over her shoulder, clasping her hand.

‘You’re brilliant at everything; you know you are,’ she murmured, as he reached down and kissed her again. He was up to eleven hair kisses and counting, although she didn’t think he was aware of it.

They were oblivious to the people milling around them in the boatyard. ‘I’m wishing we’d driven down here now, though.’

‘Why?’

‘To get you home quicker.’

‘Hmm.’ She grinned, relishing the prospect.

He pulled back as he remembered where they were. ‘...Not to mention getting the tree back.’

‘Oh, right! And how were you going to get a Christmas tree into an R8?’ she laughed.

‘Good point,’ he conceded. ‘We’ll have to carry the tree back.’

‘Excellent,’ she shrugged.

‘It’ll have to be a small one.’

‘Over my dead body. This is your first Christmas tree in years. We’re getting a whopper.’

‘Awhopper,’ he laughed, amused by her colloquial English, ‘will take two hours to carry back from here.’

She squeezed closer to him. ‘Then it’ll take two hours. It’ll become part of our legend and we’ll tell everyone all about our first date when it took us two hours to carry our first Christmas tree home.’

‘I see,’ he murmured, looking happy. ‘I’m beginning to see that dinner would have been easier.’

‘I’m not interested in easier,’ she whispered, reaching a hand to his cheek and kissing him again. She wanted today to never end. Just like she had wanted last night to roll into eternity. Every moment she shared with him, she wanted to endure.

They stopped by a stand of Nordmann firs propped against a railing. Max glanced down the row, assessing size, straightness, colour...He went over to one and stood it upright. It had to be nine feet high at least, with wide, splayed, bushy branches all the way around.

It was enormous. Unwieldy. Heavy.

She grinned at him, shucking her hands out. ‘It’s perfect.’

Chapter Twenty-Six

Denmark flashed past the windows, snowflakes dashing against the windscreen as they drove through the night. His hand was on her thigh, squeezing every few moments as if checking she was real. The past twenty-eight hours had felt like a dream and she didn’t want it to end. She didn’t want them to be driving back to the city, to their separate homes and divided lives, and she knew he felt the same. They had remained in front of the fire at Solvtraeer for as long as they possibly could, only the worsening weather finally convincing Max they had to hit the road.

She let her head loll against the headrest, gazing at his profile as he drove. ‘You’re too handsome,’ she murmured.

‘No.’

‘Yes...It made me hate you on sight.’

‘Ouch,’ he winced.

‘Yeah – that profile pic. Imperious stare, saying you don’t date...you come off as deeply arrogant. You’ll have to change it.’

He glanced over, his eyes falling to her lips and making her stomach flip, just like that. She wanted him to tell her he didn’t need that profile pic now, that he’d be closing his account...

‘Well, you still swiped right. And you definitely didn’t hate me the night we met.’ Laughter tripped through his eyes like a skipping child.

‘...No,’ she groaned, unable to deny it. ‘More’s the pity.’

---